Ukrainian president’s comments come amid suspension of planned US-Russian summit and fresh attacks on Kyiv and Kharkiv

Children among six killed in Russian attack on Kyiv

Russia said on Wednesday that preparation for a presidential summit between Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump was still continuing, despite the latter announcing it had been shelved (see 10.30am BST).

“We are saying that preparations for a summit are continuing,” Russian deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov was quoted as saying by the state TASS news agency.

I want to officially confirm: Russia has not changed its position compared to the understandings that were reached during the Alaska summit.

How the Guardian reported the stealing of art works from the Paris museum including the Mona Lisa in 1911

Louvre heist: hunt on for thieves after eight ‘priceless’ jewellery pieces stolen

23 August 1911

• La Liga president laments promoters’ decision to cancel

• Tebas criticises Real Madrid and players’ union

Javier Tebas has vowed that La Liga would try again after plans to take a game abroad fell through when promoters announced they were cancelling Villarreal’s meeting with Barcelona in Miami on 20 December.

The league had been informed of the decision on Tuesday, with an announcement made at half-time of Villarreal’s Champions League game against Manchester City at the Estadio de la Cerámica, where they will face Barcelona, instead of at the Hard Rock Stadium. The timing of the announcement was described as “a complete lack of respect” by the Villarreal coach, Marcelino García Toral.

Vilnius airport closed overnight for safety reasons after latest incursion of balloons from Belarus

Dozens of balloons used by smugglers to transport cigarettes from Belarus into Lithuania forced the temporary closure of Vilnius airport overnight.

The Lithuanian capital’s airport was closed from 11pm local time on Tuesday to 6.30am on Wednesday. Smugglers use the balloons to send Belarusian cigarettes into the European Union, where tobacco products are more expensive.

• Goalkeeper says ‘it’s looking very, very good’ for Arsenal

• Gunners have won 10 of their first 12 games of the season

David Raya has said competition for starting spots is driving Arsenal’s blistering form and the goalkeeper believes the “incredible” depth of Mikel Arteta’s squad means they are capable of challenging on multiple fronts.

The 4-0 thrashing of Atlético Madrid on Tuesday was Arsenal’s sixth successive victory and their 10th win from their first 12 matches. Arsenal have conceded only three goals – the fewest at this stage in the club’s history – to help establish a one-point lead at the top of the Premier League and a perfect record in the Champions League after three matches.

• Third series game against New Zealand set for Friday

• Banton ‘still learning’ but relishing second chance

England’s preparations for a hot, dry T20 World Cup in India in February brought them on Wednesday to a cool, drizzly Auckland, where they were forced to conduct the final training session ahead of their third game against New Zealand indoors. It is not always obvious what purpose these bilateral series serve, what useful lessons could possibly be being learned – but on this occasion, for at least one of the players, that is not an issue.

Tom Banton says he is “still learning now”, and if it is the kind of line regularly trotted out even by players who have long since scaled the pinnacle of their sport in his case it is undeniably true. After forging his reputation as a top-order batter, mostly as an opener, Banton suddenly finds himself in a completely unfamiliar role, coming in at five or six. “There weren’t really too many conversations,” he said. “I just got brought back into the team and told, ‘You’re going to bat in the middle order now.’”

The MLS postseason starts on Tuesday night. We assess the contenders for the championship, and take a look back at the talking points from the regular season

How little there was between the top teams. When all was said and done, just seven points covered the top six teams in the standings. The Supporters’ Shield race was settled with a game to spare, but any one of several sides could have finished top of the pile, which bodes well for the playoffs. Even by MLS standards, the field is wide open. GR

As Amadou and Mariam, the blind couple tenaciously carved out a career as one of Africa’s biggest global acts. Now, after Amadou’s death this year, his wife tells the story of their first posthumous album

On 4 April, Amadou Bagayoko died suddenly, aged 70, in Bamako, Mali. The country’s ministry of culture announced the news. Thousands attended the funeral, including former collaborators Manu Chao, Youssou N’Dour, Malian–French rapper Mokobé and Congolese superstar Fally Ipupa, all paying homage to a man they knew as an uncle, a blues-guitar giant, a leader, a friend.

“I miss him so much,” says Mariam Doumbia, his wife and musical partner of 44 years in the duo Amadou and Mariam. “We did everything together. We travelled together. We composed together. The sound of his guitar is always between my two ears. Especially at night, it comes into my mind. Even right now, I just heard it.”

DEI is being used as a smokescreen to roll back progress and consolidate power. The goal is to rewrite our nation’s story

Democracy flourishes when Black Americans advance. The evidence is clear: birthright citizenship, constitutional due process, anti-discrimination laws from education to housing to employment and equitable small business investments, are all byproducts of the systemic corrections known today as DEI. Yet, in recent years, DEI has been used as a smokescreen by cynical politicians and activists to roll back progress and consolidate power. Across classrooms, museums, boardrooms and federal agencies, the key pathways to opportunity and success are under attack through a coordinated disinformation campaign of erasure, distortion and suppression.

The impact of these tactics is concrete and undeniable. Since the start of this year, Onyx Impact’s research has found, 306,000 Black women have lost their jobs and $3.4bn in grant programs investing in Black communities has been slashed – including $9.4m in sickle cell disease research, $42m in programs designed to address Black maternal mortality and $31m in cuts to address asthma rates and air pollution harming Black children.

Data analysis found higher than average migration growth to the US from areas in Guatemala, Bangladesh and Senegal hit by repeated climate disasters

This article was produced in partnership between Columbia Journalism Investigations and Documented.

Mohamed* sat cross-legged on the carpet before Friday afternoon prayers at a mosque in the South Bronx in New York City and shared memories of his crops.

Stephen King, Takashi Miike and Patton Oswalt are among the contributors to this documentary about Tobe Hooper’s 1974 horror masterpiece

If you’re programming your own little horror film festival in the run-up to Halloween, and Tobe Hooper’s stone-cold classic The Texas Chain Saw Massacre from 1974 is part of the lineup, then this would make a handy follow-up for a night’s viewing. It’s not a making-of movie, although there are snippets of insight into the production’s process; nor is it a meta-commentary at the same sprawling level of Room 237, the delirious doc about The Shining. Instead, Chain Reaction is something in between, constructed in five chapters featuring interviews with five very different, almost random-seeming interlocutors who have strong feelings about The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. These are: comedian Patton Oswalt, film-makers Takashi Miike (Audition, Ichi the Killer) and Karyn Kusama (Girlfight, Jennifer’s Body), academic Alexandra Heller-Nicholas, and writer Stephen King.

One may wonder why these five people are featured and not, say, any other bunch of opinionated famous movie buffs, but at least they have pretty interesting things to say. Each quilts together their own personal experience of the film with more general musings on cinema, technique, horror vo terror, and that annoying conversation stopper at every dinner party: the zeitgeist. We learn, for instance, that Takashi first saw Texas Chain Saw when he was 15, and chose it only because he couldn’t get in to see a rereleased print of City Lights by Charlie Chaplin. (He has still not seen the latter, he says.)

Exclusive: In an open letter, Israeli ex-officials, artists and intellectuals say ‘unconscionable’ actions in Gaza amount to genocide

Prominent Jewish figures around the world are calling on the United Nations and world leaders to impose sanctions on Israel over what they describe as “unconscionable” actions amounting to genocide in Gaza.

460 signatories, including former Israeli officials, Oscar winners, authors and intellectuals have signed an open letter demanding accountability over Israel’s conduct in Gaza, the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. The letter’s release comes as EU leaders meet in Brussels on Thursday amid reports they plan to shelve proposals for sanctions over human rights violations.

The Hollywood actor will star in a new version of the Chekhov classic by writer-director Simon Stone at the Bridge theatre from July

Star Trek’s Chris Pine will boldly go to the Bridge next summer but the actor, best known for playing James T Kirk in the sci-fi reboot, is swapping the starship for the stage.

For his London theatre debut, Pine has been cast in the title role of a new version of Chekhov’s early play Ivanov by Australian writer-director Simon Stone. Produced by London Theatre Company, Ivanov will open in July at the Bridge theatre, where Stone’s update of Ibsen’s The Lady from the Sea is now running.

Call me cynical, but I have a feeling Victoria’s Secret wouldn’t have sent a heavily pregnant model down the runway if she looked like most of us do at that stage

Determined to find new ways to stay in the headlines, the underwear brand Victoria’s Secret recently had the model Jasmine Tookes – one of its most longstanding “angels” – open its runway show nine months pregnant. As a postpartum woman myself, my first thought, of course, was: “Finally! A pregnant woman I can relate to.” Only joking: it was a deep concern for her ankles, followed by a wish that one day the modelling industry will solve its recruitment crisis, because surely short-staffing is the only justifiable reason for wanting a heavily pregnant woman to work.

Nonetheless, body image and pregnancy have been on my mind recently. It is a curious thing, giving birth. We are all here because someone did it, yet what happens to women, mentally and physically, remains less known than, say, Liz Truss losing to a lettuce. And even though those of us who have given birth know intellectually that what we have done is miraculous and we should be proud, we still struggle with what it does to our physiques.

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

Treasury says trips were private while Scottish ministers point out US president met Keir Starmer and it had to stump up for extra policing

The UK government needs to “step up” and reimburse the £24.5m cost of Donald Trump and JD Vance’s recent visits to Scotland, Holyrood’s public finance minister has said.

Provisional costs of almost £24.5m for the two working visits have been published by the Scottish government.

A school production of Samuel Beckett’s masterpiece, with Nigel Planer in the cast, provided a lesson in forgetting about failure

Until I was 12 I was in the French school system, where theatre was Molière, Corneille, Racine. Going to the theatre meant The Sound of Music or My Fair Lady. Then it was decided I would switch to school in England. So, at 13, I arrived at Westminster school. It was 1968, and the world opened up.

I went to see a school production of Waiting for Godot in French in a small room with a little stage, and I was sitting at the back. Musically, I was pretty sophisticated – I already knew about all the psychedelic music that had been happening. I’d seen the Mothers of Invention. I’d seen lots and lots and lots. But I didn’t know there was stuff like this. I suddenly became aware that, just like in music, there was a whole new world out there.

Rivalries are hard and real in cricket but the game’s capacity for fluctuating, compelling narratives creates heroes out of foes

At the most famous cricket ground in the world, inside the sport’s most revered pavilion, there is a lifesize painting of a man who terrorised English cricket for 15 years. Across the manicured green turf at Lord’s, inside cricket’s most iconic media centre, the main commentary box is named after this generational tormentor. About 84 miles away, at the Rose Bowl near Southampton, an entire stand bears his name.

English cricket has every reason to hate Shane Warne. In 36 Ashes Tests he bagged 195 wickets at an average of 23.25. From his opening ball of the century at Old Trafford in 1993 to his final bow in Sydney in 2007, he seemed to operate on a different plane. This peroxided devil ruined summers and deepened cold, bitter winters, yet he became an English national treasure, the perfect reminder that cricket, above all else, is something that should be enjoyed.

This is an extract from the Guardian’s weekly cricket email, The Spin. To subscribe, just visit this page and follow the instructions.

Woman who quit panel says she was asked about ‘broader approach’, despite Shabana Mahmood’s insistence focus will not change

Grooming gang victims have accused the UK government of attempting to manipulate them into broadening a national inquiry to include other forms of sexual abuse, despite Shabana Mahmood’s insistence that the focus will not change.

They suspect that the government is trying to deflect focus away from Labour-led councils, wishes to impose a government-friendly chair and wants to avoid raising questions over the ethnicity of the perpetrators, many of whom were men of Pakistani descent.

• Updates as two unbeaten sides meet in Indore

• Get in touch! Share your thoughts with Taha

5th over: England 35-0 (Jones 16, Beaumont 14) Schutt drops short with a leg-cutter and Jones welcomes it, pulling with authority to the boundary. A delicious couple of cuts follow, with Schutt losing her length.

4th over: England 23-0 (Jones 4, Beaumont 14) Beaumont is forced back into the crease with Mooney up to the stumps, and Garth keeps her there with some fine stump-to-stump bowling. Maiden.

Keir Starmer likely to face PMQs grilling on claims the inquiry has descended into ‘chaos’

Grooming gang victims have accused the UK government of attempting to manipulate them into broadening a national inquiry to include other forms of sexual abuse despite Shabana Mahmood’s insistence the focus will not change. Rajeev Syal has the story.

UK inflation was unchanged last month at 3.8%, confounding expectations of a rise, in welcome news for the chancellor, Rachel Reeves, as she plans for her crucial budget next month, Heather Stewart reports.

Interviews with experts and key players across four countries reveal why efforts to stop the multibillion-euro trafficking industry have failed – and how to save the endangered fish

By 10am on the midsummer Day of the Ox, the city of Narita smells of charcoal and sugar. The cobbled road is thronged with visitors lining up to buy grilled eel, a traditional delicacy believed to cool the body and keep spirits up in the humid weather.

“We’ll be so sad if it becomes extinct and we can’t eat eel any more,” says a customer sitting on the tatami-mat floor in Kawatoyo, a popular restaurant specialising in grilled eel, which has been operating for more than 115 years.

Kabayaki-style eel, grilled with tare sauce, served at Kawatoyo restaurant in Narita. Photograph: Toru Hanai

Why do so many people spend their time at stage doors and sending out requests for signatures? Those who have collected thousands of autographs explain the thrill

Andrew Broughton still remembers the first celebrity autograph he ever got. “It started by accident,” he says, when he was 13 and doing a project about horror films at school. “I love Hammer horror. I wrote a letter to [actor] Peter Cushing and sent it to the BBC. A large envelope came back and a lovely letter. He sent me some signed film stills. So I got the bug. I just thought: there’s nothing to stop me writing to anybody.”

Since then, Broughton, 62, has collected autographs from some of the biggest stars in TV, film, music and sports, as well as royalty, politicians and world leaders. The walls of his home in Derby are covered in framed signed photos from the late queen, King Charles, Diana, Princess of Wales, Brigitte Bardot, John Travolta, Kylie Minogue, Elton John, Liza Minnelli, Fred Astaire, Ginger Rogers and Muhammad Ali. Broughton supplements the signatures he requests with ones he has bought at auctions and private sales. He estimates he has 10,000 in his collection.

The driving force behind Team Ninja was a game development samurai who almost always won his battles

Game designer and ex-Team Ninja boss Tomonobu Itagaki died last week aged 58. He was famous for his sunglasses, long black hair, leather jackets – and his penchant for using colourful second world war metaphors to describe game development, marketing strategies and just about anything else. A pugnacious talent, he rocked the boat and made waves in almost every aspect of his life.

Itagaki joined Japanese game developer Tecmo in 1992, as a young programmer, where he led the creation of the fighting game series Dead or Alive, the first instalment of which was released in 1996. He famously picked a long-running fight with Namco’s Tekken series, after that company’s marketing team ran an ad that he found disparaging. The resulting one-sided beef put his fighting franchise on the world stage in the early 2000s. After Dead or Alive 3, he turned his attentions to beach volleyball as a palette cleanser, before starting work on the game that would cement his legacy, a 2004 reinvention of Tecmo’s side-scrolling ninja platformer, Ninja Gaiden.

Horror tropes meet modern nightmares as the South Korean author takes us deep inside a research facility called The Institute

Our fears turn feral when they have nowhere to go. South Korean author Bora Chung’s new short story collection plays with old horror tropes: endless corridors and looped staircases, exits that only lead you deeper, a phone that rings and rings (don’t pick up). The kind of stories dare-drunk children trade in the dark.

Set in a research facility known only as “the Institute”, a repository of cursed and haunted objects, Chung’s tales come from the building’s skeleton staff – warnings and gossip from the night shift. It’s a nod, perhaps, to Stephen King’s debut collection, 1978’s still brilliant Night Shift.